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Monday, October 6, 2008

Disney Heartbeat

The essence of original Disney animation, the power all its other qualities spring from reverts almost literally to Walt’s compulsive giving of life. It is expressed as a sharing of indiscriminating life-of life, therefore, rendered maternally giving- by both organic and inorganic, human and animal, equal and fantastic elements. In early shorts, for instance, animate and inanimate being were given physically human characteristics in responding to action, as if the physical human element was the all- encompassing heartbeat. A train locomotive could have eyes and mouth, a wiener of a hotdog could be spanked on "its" butt. In the feature films, on the other hand, inanimate matter didn’t have to act human, as long as it made sense to the story line. Snow White’s castle, or the well she sings to, or any other “thing” she comes across, for example, didn’t have eyes or arms, it just fit the story. What was physically human became just emotionally human. In the beginning, indiscrimination had a physically anthropomorphic expression, developing, eventually, to the more abstract dimension of story meaning. In both cases though, this sameness of heartbeat is an all-pervading sweetness, all-inclusive warmth. Realizing or not, the audience felt within love when watching it.